Situational LeadershipⓇ – Canada

Leadership – What is it?

Firstly, leadership is not important. Secondly, what is important is how people feel when they are being led. Think of a time when you were truly inspired by someone. Remember the feeling?

I remember a time, years ago, when I was having a guitar jam session with a colleague of mine. He was an accomplished blues player, and I was really inspired to learn. He was truly a leader to me in this situation. In the language of Situational Leadership®, I was “R2,” enthusiastic, but very little skill. In other situations with this same person, I took the lead. Like when managing a business project (we also worked together). So leadership really does become a situational thing. And to quote Dr. Paul Hersey, “It’s not different strokes for different folks, it’s different strokes for the same folks, depending on the task at hand.”

So once again, leadership itself is not important. What you do with it to influence others is important. And you need to look at each individual in each situation to know how best to influence them, or help them reach higher levels of performance. At work and at home.

“High expectations and belief in people leads to high performance….so very often belief creates fact.”